Approximately 48 hours ago, I tweeted a series of messages to the six electoral candidates vying to succeed Senator Ted Kennedy in the Massachusetts delegation to Congress. I used the #masen hashtag for tracking purposes.
Here is what I sent to Michael Capuano, Steve Pagliuca, Alan Khazei, Martha Coakley, Scott Brown, and Jack E. Robinson:
With the election primary on December 8, I expected nothing. I assumed the candidates had other things to do than respond to constituents in the rapid-fire days (that I know of all too well, being an elected official myself).
I was wrong.
Capuano responded first, in two successive tweets:
You can immediately tell the candidate didn’t tweet, for they’re written in third person. I wonder, though, if he wrote any tweets during the campaign season.
Pagliuca’s response arrived next, in first person:
I replied and queried if he or an aide wrote it; I await a response.
Robinson’s press secretary, Alleigh Marre, came into my Twitter replies box third. I understand why she replied, but wouldn’t it be more pseudo-transparent if the reply came from his account, even if it looked like Capuano’s?
Sidenote: I also received a tweet from Wack E. Robinson, an anonymous parody user — and who Jack E. Robinson is suing. Personally, I’d be tickled by a parody account as it would increase my name awareness, but I’m not Jack.
As for Khazei, one of his staffers looked up my phone number on my Twitter profile and called me the next morning, leaving a voicemail message. Nice touch.
Coakley and Brown were the only two candidates who didn’t respond within the past 48 hours.
The big question in my mind, regardless who is elected to succeed Kennedy — in Tuesday’s primary and the general election in January — is whether that man or woman will continue tweeting alongside other Congressional Twitter users.
As of right now, the only members of the Massachusetts delegation on Twitter are Senator John Kerry and Representative Edward Markey. Neither account is interacting with constituents, but at least they’re up. Baby steps.
Who will emerge victorious on December 8 and January 19? Time will tell, and I intend to continue monitoring their online media presences. They’re using YouTube and Facebook, not to mention news updates on their websites, but Twitter? Hmmm.
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{ 5 comments… read them below or add one }
Interesting results. Seems like candidate/campaign participation is inching up. It will be a real breakthrough when the frontrunners take Twitter seriously as a conversational medium.
Well done Ari – helped me get more focus on the reasons to vote for Khazei. Have a good day.
wow, I did not expect that response. It seems that twitter is becoming quite handy for communicating with all kinds of people. Thanks for your post.
Wow, it’s becoming a small world and communication tools are really streamlining the way we live. Very interesting.
Isn’t it funny the two candidates who didn’t reply to me last month were the two who moved on to the general election?